Cantor Anarquista

Here is a song recorded by mselasco (me!) that is based on a poem entitled Cantor Anarquista ("Anarchist Singer"). The poem was written in 1927 by the famous anarchist payador named Martin Castro, who would travel the country singing songs of protest and freedom. In addition to being a brilliant poet and musician, Castro also directed an anarchist cultural magazine called La Voz de los Tiempos (The Voice of the Times) that featured artwork, poetry, short stories, and reviews. His efforts were essential in creating a culture of resistance that gave the anarchist movement in Argentina a larger sense of community and identity.




El Cantor Anarquista

Guitarra del alma mía,
Tu vibración esplendente
Al ancho mar de mi mente
Lo inunda de inspiración
Contigo formo tribuna
Y al pueblo que sufre y siente
En verso rudo y valiente
Le hablo de su redención.

Mi verso no es el badajo
Que hará sonar la campana
Apostólica romana
De la mentida piedad:
Nunca, mi ideal no se vende,
Mi carácter no se allana,
Ante la miseria humana
Que hiere a mi dignidad.

No elogiaré al fabricante
Porque se que es un tirano,
Que desde el niño al anciano
Les usurpa el sudor,
Jamás llevaré en mi frente
Tan vergonzosa mancilla.
Haré mi guitarra astillas
Antes de herir mi pudor.

No prostituiré al cerebro
Con hurras a los cosacos,
No es himno de policíacos
Mi canción libre y triunfal.
Nunca llegaré a ser cómplice
De tan baja mansedumbre,
Ni hundiré en la podredumbre
La pureza de mi ideal.

Mi verso no es gloria patria,
No ensalzaré en mis cantares
A laureados militares
Enemigos de la paz.
Yo voy hacia un pueblo libre,
Sin esclavos ni señores,
Sin envidias ni rencores
De un sentimiento solaz.

No aplaudiré al propietario,
Que fronteriza, que encierra
En lotes la libre tierra,
Desconociendo su embrión:
La tierra es libre. es del pueblo
Toda la extensión del globo.
Lo propiedad es un robo
Definida por Prohudon.

De la santa religión.
Banqueros y gobernantes.
Propietarios, comerciantes.
Es el trust del capital.
Trust que lo sostiene el pueblo
Sometido al barbarismo,
Del torvo militarismo
Y la tribu policial.

Si la religión católica
Prostituye y mistifica,
El propietario trafica
Con la tierra maternal.
El fabricante es el pulpo
Que vive del hambre ajeno.
El militar es el freno
Del engranaje fatal.

El hombre ha creado la ley
Para inculcar la obediencia,
Impuesto por la violencia,
Aplastando la razón,
Leyes fatuas que dividen
La fortuna y la miseria,
Y de la misma materia
El esclavo y el mandón.

Entre el amo y el esclavo,
Entre el amor y el desdén,
Entre la maldad y el bien,
Entre el ocio y la labor,
De pie con la frente erguida,
Combatimos la codicia
Con un ideal de Justicia,
De felicidad y amor.


The Anarchist Singer

Guitar of my soul,
Your resplendent vibration
Floods with inspiration
The wide sea of my mind
With you I form a stage
And speak of redemption
To the people who suffer and feel
In verses coarse and valiant.

My verse is not the clapper
That will bring about the ringing
Of the holy roman bell
Of false piety:
Never, my ideal cannot be sold,
My character cannot be broken,
Before the human misery
That wounds my dignity.

I will not praise the manufacturer
Because he is a tyrant,
Who usurps the sweat of all
From the child to the elder,
I will never carry on my forehead
Such a shameful stain.
I will break my guitar into splinters
Before wounding my decency.

I will not prostitute the mind
With cheers for the Cossacks,
My free and triumphant song
Is no police anthem.
I will not become accomplice
To such base docility,
Nor will I sink the purity of my ideal
Into that putridity.

My verse is not for patriotic glory,
My songs will not exalt
Military heroes,
Enemies of peace.
I move towards a free people,
Without slaves nor masters,
Without envy nor resentment
Of a comforting sentiment.

I will not applaud the landowner,
Who makes borders, who encloses
In lots the free land,
Unaware of his embryo:
The land is free. The entire span of the globe
Is of the people.
Property is theft
As defined by Proudhon.

The monopoly of Capital.
Belongs to the holy Church,
The Bankers and governors,
Landowners and businessmen.
The trust holds the people
Submitted to the barbarism
of grim militarism
and the police tribe.

As the catholic religion
Prostitutes and mystifies,
The landowner traffics
The maternal earth.
The manufacturer is the octopus
That lives off others’ hunger.
The military is at the controls
Of the fatal machine.

Man has created laws
To instill obedience,
Imposed through violence,
Crushing reason,
Fatuous laws that divide
The fortunate and the miserable,
And in the same manner
The master and slave.

Between master and slave,
Between love and disdain,
Between good and evil,
Between idleness and labor,
Standing with heads held high,
We fight against greed
With an ideal of justice,
Happiness and love.

(English translation by the Poison Oak Collective)